From The Publisher - June 2013

06/07/2013 01:11PM
● Published by Christy Quebedeaux

Lately the news coming out of Washington has been dominated with details of three major scandals: the IRS targeting conservatives, the Justice Department going through normally confidential phone records of AP and Fox News reporters, and the horrific attack of our Benghazi consulate.

Members of Congress, our elected representatives, are conducting separate hearings into each one of these scandals. We, the people, deserve to know what were the details associated with each one of these issues. In the IRS case and the Justice Department case, we need to know who was involved, who issued the orders to proceed, and who knew the details and when did they know it. As for the Benghazi situation, we need to learn who exactly issued the orders for our forces in Libya to stand down and who turned down the former Ambassador’s request for additional security. All three of these situations should be extremely unsettling to you and I and every other red-blooded American.

You would think this information would be readily forthcoming, given that it all occurred under three of the major wings of government: the State Department, the Justice Department, and the IRS. But regrettably, the details are being kept within the departments. As Congress has called upon various individuals to testify under oath before their committees, we often get non-answers to direct questions. This is a technique often used by politicians and those in government service to avoid answering the direct question, but addressing something other than what was asked.

Recently, the folks who have been subpoenaed and questioned under oath before these committees all too often have suffered from a loss of memory. Hence, the common answer to hard questions has been, “I don’t know.” It is understandable that some people don’t know every detail involved with an incident, but the sudden rash of lack of knowledge is troubling. It appears that under oath, some of these people are simply not telling the truth. Still others seem to weave tales that are far-fetched, completely contradicted by the information that has already been revealed.

So my question in this charade is, “Why not tell the truth?” Sooner or later, most of the actual details will come out. Thankfully, several whistleblowers have bravely stepped forward and enlightened us on some of the details. Why won’t the other parties involved simply tell us the truth? If any of the people testifying before Congress under oath are found to have been lying, they should be prosecuted and sentenced accordingly. But too often these “lies” are overlooked or forgiven.

Failure to hold officials in the government accountable for their misdeeds is undermining the integrity of our country.

Verse of the Month

“Who is there like you, the God who removes guilt and pardons sin for the